Among the Gnostic groups that gave birth to Nazism were the Vril Society and the Thule Group, or Thule Gesellschaft, both in Germany. The Vril Society was established in Berlin around the late 19th or early 20th century, and the Thule Group was founded by the Baron Rudolf von Sebottendorf in Munich in 1918. The known journalist and writer Dietrich Eckart, who sponsored Hitler in his first political campaign, was a member of the Thule Society.

A private ceremony of the S.S.

The author of Hitler and the Cathar Tradition, Jean M. Angebert, affirms about Rudolf Hess, Alfred Rosenberg, Dietrich Eckart, Karl Haushofer, and Max Amann: “All these people, as far as I could verify, belonged to secret societies, either to the Thule Group or the Vril Society. It is not surprising, therefore, that all of them were involved in performing the rites of the new religion of the Swastika cross.

“Once a political base, financial support and a secret society that could control Hitler were established, the National Socialist Party was transformed into the war machine of these new Gnostics. They had at their disposal a formidable detonator, Adolf Hitler, the chosen man with the qualities to awaken Germany from its lethargic sleep and become the docile instrument of his magical designs. On his deathbed in 1923, Dietrich Eckart confessed to his intimate friends: ‘Follow Hitler. He will dance according to the music I wrote. We gave him the means to communicate with them [no explanation as to who he meant by them]. Do not lament my death, because through him I will influence History more than any other German’” (p. 209).

Nazi Gnosis: the coming of the man-god

The Gnosis of Nazism pretended to act over man in order to transform the universe; in a reverse way, it also pretended to act over the universe in order to transform man. Angebert comments:

“From this perspective, matter acts over spirit and vice-versa, in a way that will cause a transmutation of all values so that the superman might reach the omega point, the point of perfection. This would be the meaning of the words: ‘I am the alpha and the omega’ spoken by Christ, and also of the Gnostic myth whereby the serpent ends by biting its own tail, that is, the Gnostic process ends by returning to its origin. At the base of this doctrine reserved to a small group appears an absurd pride eager to make of man his own god, destroying traditional morals and despising almost all of mankind, which would be destined to return to the chaos that existed at the beginning” (p. 217).

On the Gnostic thinking regarding race, Nazism was supported by Ernest Renan, the blasphemous author of a life of Jesus, who wrote in his work Philosophic Dialogues (Paris, 1876): “A broad application of the discoveries of philosophy and the principle of natural selection could lead to the creation of a superior race, which would have the right to govern [the world], not only because of its science, but also because of its superior blood, brain and nerves. They would be some kind of gods or devas, beings who are ten times what we are. These beings could be produced in artificial environments. In normal conditions nature does not produce them, but science could extend the limits of viability” (apud Hitler and the Cathar Tradition, p. 217).

Nuremberg 1934, the cult to the Aryan superman on Nazi Party Day

Renan knew the cycle of the Aryan legends of Asgard - the mythical country of superior white men who would be the Hyperboreans, the ancestors of the present day Indo-Europeans. He gave his support to the possibility of a new race of such men: “A factory of supermen, an Asgard, could be rebuilt in the center of Asia … Just as mankind came from the animal, so divinity would proceed from humanity. These would be beings who would transcend men, just as men transcend animals … I repeat, their intellectual superiority would imply a religious superiority. We should imagine these future lords as incarnations of goodness and truth, and be ready to subordinate ourselves to them” (apud ibid.).

Renan continues: “With this, one can imagine a time when everything that previously existed in a stage of embryonic conception or vague myth would then exist in the stage of reality and truth: gods, paradise, hell, spiritual power, monarchy, nobility, legitimacy, racial superiority, supernatural powers – all can be reborn by the work of man and reason. It seems to me that if such a solution should materialize on earth, it will be accomplished through Germany” (apud ibid, p. 218-219). Behold, here we have the French rationalist Renan as the prophet of Nazism…

Another major contribution to Nazi theogony [the occult explanation of divinity] came from the theories of Hans Horbiger on Welteislehre (World Ice Theory). Hitler gave full support to his Gnostic thinking: “Horbiger, who drank from the profound myths lying in the subconscious of man, was a partisan of the theory of the cycles acclaimed by Plato. Earth, life, mankind did not experience a continuous evolution, but an ascension like the teeth of a saw, interrupted by falls that caused creation to return to its previous stage. After the civilization of the giants, Earth experienced unknown catastrophes where whole continents disappeared (like Atlantis and Hyperborea), resulting also in the degradation of the superior man. To re-discover the man-god, there must be a new mutation that will bring a new cycle of life to our universe. Here we again find the Nazi ideas about man and the world” (pp. 224-225).

Nazism, an intolerant religion

At the beginning of the 20th century, the Jewish-French philosopher Henri Bergson prophesized: “The universe is a machine to make gods.” Teilhard de Chardin echoed this idea, admitting that a change in the universal process of evolution could give rise to “some type of ultra-human” (p. 230). This thesis merges with the theory of biological change which had just been born.

Hitler, the supposed messiah of a new Nazi millennium

Nazi leaders found support in this theory for their desire to create the Aryan superman: “The new man lives amidst us. ‘He is here,’ Hitler exclaimed triumphantly. ‘Is this enough for you? I will tell you a secret. I have seen the new man. He is intrepid and cruel’” (Hermann Rausching, Hitler m’a dit, apud Hitler et la Tradition Cathare, p. 230).

After the millennium during which Nazism would rule, evolution would reach its apex. At this point, the two great principles - good and evil, spirit and matter - would separate and return to their roots. Light would return to the great initial light, and darkness to the accumulated darkness. “The last particles of light will gather together in a gigantic form that will lift up to heaven; at the same time, matter will form an enormous sphere (bolos) similar to the original chaos. This is how in the end times the two great contrary principles, like fire and ice, will separate themselves from each other, as they were in the beginning” (p. 229).

Nazism was a new religion symbolized by the Volk [German people] myth that aimed to deify the Aryan blood and race. It collided with Christianity. The head of the Nazi Labor Front, Robert Ley, was clear in this respect when he declared: “Our faith is National Socialism. Only it can save us, and it does not tolerate any other faith except for it” (p. 245).

Deep antagonism between Catholicism and Nazism

The antagonism between the Catholic Church and Nazism was not, as some pretend, political, but rather the fight between a new pagan religion and the true Religion of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

Chancellor Franz von Papen, left, and Secretary of State Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, center, sign a Concordat the Third Reich proposed to the Holy See - July 20, 1933

The Concordat negotiated by the Third Reich with the Holy See through Franz Von Papen was nothing more than an anesthetic to put the Catholic adversary to sleep in order to more easily destroy it.

The so-called “Positive Christianity” of Nazism was really the religion of the German race and blood, that is, the vision of the world proper to National Socialism, one of the greatest dangers the Holy See had faced in History. This “Positive Christianity,” which was never clearly explained, seems to be nothing but a pseudo Christianity. It took from Catholicism - as Fr. Hecker did in the heresy of Americanism - only the so-called “active” virtues, rejecting the “passive” virtues and the “negative” elements, particularly the Old Testament and the Epistles of St. Paul. The Nazi leaders were the only ones allowed to define “Positive Christianity.” As Black Body, an organ of the S.S., remarked: “Since Positive Christianity is a term introduced by National Socialism, only National Socialism is qualified to interpret it” (p. 247).

The key to understand the puzzle

It was not only this concept of Positive Christianity, but actually the whole Nazi doctrine that remained a mystery. One thing was what filtered to the knowledge of the grassroots, and another was what was professed by the high initiated members of National Socialism. In the January 6, 1960 issue of the French weekly Carrefour, historian Jacques Nobecourt affirmed this about the systematic elimination of the mentally ill during the time of the Third Reich: “The hypothesis of an initiated group of persons underlying National Socialism became more and more likely. It would be a truly demonic group, governed by occult dogmas, much more sophisticated than the elementary doctrine of Mein Kampf or the Myth of the 20th Century” (Hitler and the Cathar Tradition, p. 258).

Angebert comments: “Agreeing with this judgment, we can affirm that notwithstanding the disappearance of the documents concerning the initiation rituals of the higher echelons of the S.S., it is easy to reconstitute the pieces of the magic puzzle in order to understand the phenomenon. Our explanation has the advantage of putting together the history, culture and esoteric aspects of the Nazi vision of the world, based on what it is presented as the origin of the white race up to the Middle Ages in general, and up to Montsegur in particular” (p. 259).

The author adds: “Why were the books of Otto Rahn – an officer and member of the higher research body of the S.S. - The Crusade against the Grail and The Court of Lucifer in Europe, made obligatory reading by Himmler, the commanding general of the S.S., for all superior officers of this new Teutonic Order, if not to confer on them the role of gospels? Works of this sort were not numerous and the fact that their reading was made obligatory seems to prove that they contained the key to the Nazi vision of the world. This seems logical to anyone who makes the effort to examine them” (p. 259). He concludes: “In our view, everything is ordered around the central theme of the Grail” (p. 260).